100% and Shopping Day

"So you're 100% certain about this?" Amanda asked them several weeks later.

"Absolutely," Kurt nodded.

"We're sure," Noah agreed.

"Alright," Amanda smiled widely at them, "Well, all your information check out. It'll take a few weeks for these papers to go through, but once you sign them it'll only be a short while before Shane and Maisie are officially yours.

Kurt and Noah were beaming as they signed paper after paper after paper. But finally, it was done.

"There we go," Amanda said, "Like I said, these will take a few weeks to go through. But once it does I'll give you a call."

"And then we can take them home?" Noah asked.

"Yes," she nodded, "Do you gentleman have any questions?"

"Actually, I do have one," Kurt replied, "We've been trying to prepare for bringing them home for a while now, but do you have any advice? Anything you think we should that we may not have thought of?"

"Well, you know from your first meeting with them that school is an obstacle for both children," Amanda said, "So that's something you need to prepare for. Home schooling might be something you consider, especially for Maisie as she is so young and her medication and treatments can wipe her out sometimes. But for Shane, from talking to the women at the group home, the biggest issue for him seems to be lack of classroom support. The school he's at now doesn't have the resources to help him and as much as we've tried to, there's only so much we can do. Now, have you got their rooms set up?"

"We were waiting until we knew things were official," Kurt said and she nodded in understanding.

"I would recommend beds that are close to the ground, maybe even putting bars on the sides," Amanda said, "The woman who runs the group home says Shane's had nightmares and fallen out of bed before and Maisie sometimes needs machines to help her breathe at night so the less heavy lifting everyone has to do would probably be better. I know all this probably seems like a lot, but honestly, at the end of the day, trust your gut. I knwo you both have done a lot of reading and research on things you can do so trust your instincts. Everything else will come time."

"Thank you so much," Kurt said as he and Noah shook her hand. "Honestly, you've helped us more than either of us can express."

"I've been supervising Shane and Maisie's case since they entered the system," Amanda said, "It's good to see them finally going to a good home." They shook hands again and then left her office, climbing into the car.

"So what do we do now?" Kurt asked.

"Well, we've only got a few weeks until they're home with us," Noah said, "I'd say it's about time we got their rooms ready. Why don't we head home and take some measurements and then tomorrow we can got shopping for stuff for their rooms?"

"That sounds like a perfect idea to me," Kurt said happily, "I can't believe this is happening. In a few weeks we're going to be parents!"

Noah chuckled as Kurt all but squealed in happiness and the pair drove off home.

MOVINGONMOVINGONMOVINGONMOVINGONMOVINGONMOVINGON

The next day, Kurt and Noah left their house early, ready to spend the whole day buying everything (or almost everything) Shane and Maisie would need.

"Alright, so, first things first is the paint," Kurt said, looking down at his list. If we can get that today and then go order the furniture we can paint their room rooms tonight. That way they'll be perfectly aired out by the time the kids are sleeping in them."

"Sounds good babe," Noah said, "What are we doing about getting them clothes and toys and stuff?"

"For now we just get the bare essentials, enough to make sure they know they're home for good, but we also don't want to get too much stuff that they may not like or not fit properly or that isn't comfortable for them. I think we should get them settled in and then after a couple weeks we'll take them shopping. Sam with toys and things like that. We have an idea of what they like from all the meetings we had, but we can look at stuff like that when we go shopping too. Same goes for books."

Noah nodded and they pulled into the parking lot of the paint store.

"Alright, so Maisie told me at our last visit that she loves the colour yellow so I figured we could do her room yellow, maybe throw some purple in there?"

"Alright," Noah nodded, "And Shane's favourite colours are red and black."

Kurt sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose as Noah chuckled.

"Neither of which I want to put on walls," Kurt said.

"I know, but we can't do Maisie's room in her favourite colour and not Shane's," Noah pointed out.

"I know, I would never dream of doing that," Kurt sighed again, "Alright, what if we do three dark grey and one red? I just don't want to put black on his walls now because if he decides he hates it when he's older or if we ever move it's going to be impossible to paint over."

"That sounds fair," Noah said, "And if he grows up into an angsty teenager and still wants black walls then we can always paint over the lighter colours."

"Exactly," Kurt said, "Let's go." He and Noah got out of the car and went into the store, wandering up and down the aisles, looking for the best deal. They finally found it and purchased their paint before heading to the furniture store.

This proved to be much more difficult than the paint and they spent the next several hours looking at beds and dressers and bookshelves, but nothing they found seemed right.

"What was the problem with that last one?" Noah asked in exasperation.

"It just wasn't right," Kurt shook his head.

"Why not?"

"I just... I'm worried we're going to get something and it'll hurt," Kurt admitted, "It's not like we can afford to buy all new furniture twice. This is our only chance."

"Babe, it'll be fine-" Noah started.

"But what if it's not?" Kurt cut him off, "There's so many things that could go wrong. Shane could fall out of bed, he could slip or trip on something! What if Maisie stops breathing? What do we do then? What if we buy something and she's allergic to it or it makes her sick? What if-"

"What if? What if? What if?" Noah gripped Kurt's shoulders, "Kurt, we could go on about the what ifs all day, but what's the point? Whether we were adopting two healthy kids or not, there are always going to be things that can go wrong. but that doesn't mean we focus on them. If we do that then what kind of life are we giving them, huh? We can't treat them like they're sick kids, not twenty-four-seven."

"I know," Kurt sighed, "I know, I'm sorry. I don't mean to do this, I just..."

"You're worried," Noah said, "It's alright, I am too. but we can't let them now what."

Kurt nodded again and took a deep breath. "Alright, let's do this."

They began looking at the furniture again and eventually found everything they would need. Beds that were close to the ground for both children, furniture with rounded edges for Shane, and one of the employees at the store had even helped them find furniture made of a material that wouldn't gather dust as quickly as others.

"This stuff'll be perfect for them," Kurt said happily, "I think we should still do what Amanda said and get some guard rails for the sides of the bed, at least for a little while until they're used to the place."

"Makes sense, we can try taking them off after a while of them being home," Noah said, "So, feeling better now?"

"Yes, thank you," Kurt said.

"Well good, because paint and furniture I can do, but clothes are still your area of expertise."

Alright, so I hope an entire chapter about shopping wasn't too boring! Thanks so much for reading and let me know what you think!

New chapter will be up next Monday and the kids finally get to see their new home!